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Disclaimer: This is not a panic/hysteria site. We’re interested in learning all we can about the US response to the disease and whether our governmental institutions are funded adequately to respond optimally.

With that in mind, you can watch the hearings online at PBS.org. So far, we have had opening statements from the CDC (Friedan), NIH (Fauci), BARDA (Robinson), FDA (Borio) and a representative from Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.

The most notable announcement so far was from Anthony Fauci from the NIH. He says that Nina Pham will be transferred to the NIH this evening for further treatment.

Also note that there will be a lot of Republicans and Democrats on this committee who voted to cut the budgets of these institutions when they approved the sequester. So, keep that in mind when you listen to these bloviators.

And, now, on with the live blog. Geeks are encouraged to comment because I’m pretty sure there is going to be technical information presented, especially wrt to drug discovery efforts.

Why are we not restricting flights? Friedan says not helpful to curtail flights. I agree with this. But this doesn’t mean we can’t screen and quarantine people once people get here. Ellis Island performed this function.

Diane DeGette (D- CO) asking a series of fact finding questions regarding burgeoning epidemic. Oooo, she’s good.
Did the hospital provide training?
Hospital: No
OMG, she must have been a killer lawyer.

So,it looks to me that the Republicans are trying to paint the president as culpable because he is not preventing flights. Democrats seem to be trying to find out where the breakdown in the system was.
Ehhhhh, I’m going with the D’s on this one.

Blackburn: is ebola waste as contagious as a patient with ebola.
Friedan: waste can be easily treated.
Blackburn: Does CDC work with hospital to get rid of waste?
Friedan: Yes, we work with DOT
Blackburn: Seems to be going with NIMBY argument.

Braley: Vaccine manufacturer is working on scaling up. They have requested assisted with HHS. What is HHS doing to move contracts forward?
Robinson: accelerating contracting with HHS.
Fauci: HHS working on phase I trial.

Shakowsky (D-Il): Weak health systems spread ebola. Wants to focus on US hospitals. Do we have ability to train and equip our hospitals and staff?
We still don’t have a good answer as to why 2 nurses caught ebola. What was wrong with the protocols?

Shak: How come the nurses in Dallas weren’t protected.
Friedan: The first three days, no one knew Duncan had ebola.
Degette: But the protocols said the hospital should have taken precautionary measures, right?
Friedan: Yes, he was being isolated. But in first 3 days, there was variability in protocol execution.
Shak: How do we train health care workers?
Friedan: 1.) Train nurses 2.) awareness 3) contact CDC for immediate response team

Unknown bloviator without name tag (presumably Republican) abbreviated UB.
UB: Protocol breakdown! Pham was using full protective measures. What breaches caused her infection?

I’m seeing another trend here. Republicans don’t seem to be interested in improving protocols or response. They seem to be interested in pointing out how government institution protocols are completely useless against this disease.

Johnson (R-OH): We don’t know what we don’t know. Somebody needs to know the details. Do we know how the nurses got ebola?
(same stupid questions)
Friedan: Investigation still ongoing.
Johnson cuts him off.

Johnson: As a military war planner (which is so much like an epidemiologist), we don’t wait for the bullets to start flying. when was the CDC aware of the outbreak in West Africa.
Friedan: Late March
Johnson: Military does pre-planning. It knows what to do (which is why we were so on top of ISIS, but I digress)
Friedan: Yep, we do that kind of stuff.
Johnson: Which hospital in OHIO had that kind of strategic planning?
Friedan: Don’t know

Matheson: ebola not airborne. Buit there are other airborne pathogens. How do we learn from this ebola outbreak?
Friedan: To prevent disease at the source and support hospital, community and public health efforts

That’s funny. I don’t find him hard to understand. I think the problem is that the CDC is not a free man in Paris. It needs to operate through state agencies. That might explain why he sounds bureaucratic.

Scalise: We need a travel ban until you geeks can prove Americans are absolutely safe
Friedan: We don’t rule out anything.
Scalise: Have you had conversations with the WH about a travel ban.
Friedan: We talked about travel. I can’t speak for the WH.

DeGette: Summarizing. We can train nurses better. We can more robust protective gear. CDC could be on the ground earlier.
Friedan: Agree on training and gear. We consult immediately. We can’t be everywhere.

That’s why I say people from other hospitals but, under a CDC contract or something. We can’t stop pandemics if hick hospitals have to make it up as they go along. Someone from Nebraska or Emery hospitals should have got down there in the first hours. the CDC should be authorized to coordinate that.

Murphy: He wants an apology. People lie. Protocols may not be followed. Protective gear inadequate.
He wants travel ban. Mandatory quarantine for Americans who have treated patients in Africa.
Then the same stuff as Degette.
Remove statutory language, more funding.
Better diagnostics.
Transport stuff
Stop ebola in africa

So, in essence, DeGette and Murphy are more or less on the same page except for the travel ban.

I didn’t hear that she developed symptoms while on the plane except for the elevated temperature.
Like Friedan said, a travel ban will probably not be effective because the borders of the three most affected countries are very porous. So, it would be relatively easy for someone who has to come here for whatever reason to skirt the restriction by taking a different route out of africa. And if that happens and it’s not noted on the passport where the passenger is from, there’s no way to know to monitor them when they arrive here. So, I agree that a travel ban at this point will probably be counterproductive and is being used as a political issue. It won’t stop the infection from getting here if someone is determined to do it. It only makes the Democrats look callous, lax and unconcerned.
Have we learned nothing about the way the Republican mind works?

I think I asked these questions when Duncan first got sick in Dallas. If congress and the states want to do anything productive, they could pass a law making it mandatory that employers pay their quarantined workers, provide internet access for them to perform their work from home, and guarantee their jobs, without stigma or discrimination, when they are able to return to work. That right there might help prevent infections.

Not helpful to curtail flights? Uganda and Kenya and maybe some other East African countries have banned flights to–from Ebolastan.
If they get zero cases of this particular ebola outbreak, then their decision to ban flights will have proven correct.

What would screening achieve. I know that if I had “prebola” , I would lie like hell to get into a country where I would get good treatment. Just like Mr. Duncan lied like hell to get back into America.

Hopefully India and China will have the sense to ban travel to or from Ebolastan, including travel of Indian/Chinese expats for the duration of the epidemic. Picture ebola running amok in the slums and villages of India.

I am really surprised at the number of people who are falling for the travel ban argument.
Remember “cut and run”? If you say something over and over again, it starts to stick. But just because it is sticking doesn’t mean it’s rational.
It’s not rational.
Friedan gave very good reasons why a travel ban is a dumb idea. Was no one paying attention or has fear of ebola taken hold?
There is not going to be an epidemic in this country. We are not West Africa. What we have here is a gigantic screw up by a hospital in Texas. Now that we know what we’re dealing with, i.e. private for profit health care and lax staff training, we can deal with new cases more efficiently and safely.
Jeez, I’m pounding a brick wall with my head aren’t I?

No. I get it. But, it’s the politics. If you can get something by agreeing to the travel ban, then do it. But, make sure you’re getting something useful.

I am way more worried about logistics of quarantine. I think we’ll have people hiding (is that cut and run?) from that — and the fear of losing all possessions. Is there a way to contain contagious disease while not stripping families of all possessions?

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Body: Last week I went down to Washington, D.C. to deliver a paper at a conference in the technical field where I worked, ten years or so and two or three careers ago, before the dot.com trash. The trip was solely an exercise in merit-making, since I doubt very much I'll get work in the field, but reconnecting with old friends was really great -- even […]

The Hill, "Court orders Iran to pay billions to 9/11 victims and families: A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Iran to pay billions of dollars in damages to the families of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks." It's unlikely they will actually pay it, but the very idea that Iran should have to pay for an attack by Saudi Arabians is pr […]